Garden staircases made in steel for your outside space

Steps from the house down to the garden

The garden staircase we fit most often runs from a kitchen door or rear extension down to the lawn, where the floor sits a metre or so above the garden. A straight flight with a small top landing is usually enough. The landing gives you somewhere to stand while you open the door and lets the flight turn to run along the wall rather than out into the garden. We fix it to sound brickwork with resin anchors, or put it on its own posts where the wall is old and soft, and the flight lands on a concrete pad. Risers are equal, between 150mm and 220mm, with goings of at least 220mm, as Approved Document K asks for a private stair. The handrail sits at 900mm and the guarding has no gap a 100mm sphere can pass through.

Custom garden steps for sloping and terraced gardens

Long gardens on the North Downs often climb or drop several metres, and old concrete or timber steps cut into a bank heave, rot and move. A steel staircase on stringers and pads keeps the treads level, and because it is light you can run it beside planting without building a retaining wall. We draw the flight to suit the slope: one long run with a rest landing, or two or three short flights broken by paved or gravel landings, with a change of direction if there are more than 36 risers in a row. Treads can be open mesh, so leaves fall through and the steps drain, or steel trays that take stone setts, brick or timber so the stair looks like part of the garden rather than something bolted onto it.

Basement and lightwell steps

In the older streets of South London, Bromley and Croydon many garden steps go down rather than up: into a lightwell, a basement flat or a sunken patio. The walls are old brick and space is tight, so the survey checks what the fixings will bite into and whether the flight can be carried through the house or has to come over the wall. Winders let it turn in a corner where there is no room for a landing. Where the stair serves a flat rather than one house, the guarding goes to 1100mm and the balustrade takes the higher BS 6180 load for shared use. If it is the escape route from a basement flat, Approved Document B applies and we supply drawings and calculations for building control. Galvanising matters most here, because lightwells never dry out.

Spiral stairs from balcony to garden

A spiral staircase takes you from a first-floor balcony or terrace down to the garden in a footprint of 1.5m to 2m across, so they suit narrow London gardens. A 1400mm diameter is workable at a house; 1600mm to 1800mm is more comfortable, and worth having if you will carry things up and down. Treads are chequer plate or perforated plate for grip. The centre column bolts to a concrete pad at the bottom, the top tread and landing fix to the balcony steel or the wall, and nothing bears on the balcony deck. Approved Document K sends spiral stairs to BS 5395-2, which sets the going along the walking line, so we draw each stair to the measured floor-to-garden height and split it into equal risers. The balcony guarding stays at 1100mm; the spiral's own balustrade runs at 900mm.

Finishes, handrails and non-slip treads

Every mild steel part outside is hot-dip galvanised. Left bare it weathers to a soft grey within a year and needs nothing more. Powder coating over the galvanising gives you colour: black and anthracite are the usual picks, green or bronze if you want the stair to sit back into planting. Stainless steel handrails and glass panels give a cleaner look and keep the view across a raised terrace; glass without a top rail is toughened laminated, as BS 6180 asks. Non-slip treads are not optional outside: open mesh, chequer plate and perforated plate all grip when wet. You want sturdy handrails outside, so ours are steel tube welded to posts that are welded to the stringers, not bolted on afterwards, with a timber top rail on brackets if you want something warmer to hold.

Estimates, surveys and lead times

Send us two photos and the height from the door threshold to the ground and you will have a written estimate within the working day; phones are answered 24 hours a day. The site survey is free: we measure the total rise and the run available, check the wall and ground for fixings, note drains and manholes, and look at how a welded flight gets into the garden. The quotation is fixed and only moves if the design changes. Price is driven by the total rise, the width, the number of landings, and the treads and guarding you choose; galvanised mild steel with mesh treads costs the least, stainless and glass the most. Once you sign off the drawing the stair is made and galvanised over a few weeks, and fitting a single flight is usually a day.

Straight answers on garden staircases